A chilling reminder of what's at stake

January 23, 2006|From the Dallas Morning News

The release Thursday of the latest tape from Osama bin Laden is a chilling reminder of how high the stakes are in the international war on terrorism. Prevailing in this effort will require the kind of resolve that the United States just demonstrated when it launched the latest in a series of air strikes inside Pakistan. After hearing days of condemnation of the attack and the death of civilians, we now have a fuller understanding of the event: Members of al-Qaida's brain trust were sitting down to feast in a remote border village. Tipped by intelligence sources, the CIA moved a Predator drone into position overhead, and its missiles obliterated the target. The attack succeeded in killing at least four key members of the terror organization, including a master bombmaker-poison expert with a $5 million bounty on his head. U.S. officials originally thought al-Qaida's No. 2 man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was at the gathering, but he has not been listed among the dead. The immediate effect on al-Qaida is impossible to calculate, since the terror network has spawned a network of cells worldwide. But there should be no question about the wisdom of continuing hard blows on the leadership to keep key members on the run and take a long-term toll on the organization's ability to plot new mayhem. Experts say it's only coincidental that the new bin Laden tape is just now surfacing. On it, the terror master addresses the American people and offers a "long-term truce with fair conditions." The offer doesn't merit response beyond this: No thanks, and we hope you're feeling the heat.